Karaoke Forums

Steven,

The difficulty in pronouncing some English word /sounds varies from race to race and not just from country to country, and you are right , many chinese see no diffrent between  l and r. This 'problem' is not just confined to the chinese. We have a non-chinese singer here who sing words like 'run'as 'lun' and 'lorry' as 'rolly','light' as 'right' and 'right' as 'light'.

And in singing I think they have to be extremly aware of those diff sound to get it right. Thats how I do it in both normal talking or in singing. Practice does help.

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I can neither confirm nor deny ever having or knowing anything about nothing.... mrscott

1.  Stutterers not stuttering when they sing... (without becoming terribly technical) ... opposite sides of the brain are used for speech and music. Generating speech (conversation) requires "thought" ...... whereas, with singing, the words and "cadence" are provided. Therefore, the act of singing... is more "learned/automatic" than the act of speaking, and can be practiced. Think about the difference between reciting a nursery rhyme, or a prayer, or the pledge of alligence ... and gettting up and spontaneously speaking... i.e... called on in class, etc....

Even tho singing "resembles" speaking.... Singing is really a much more "automatic, reflexive and rhythmic process.. than the actual process of "generating speech".... and because opposite sides of the brain are responsible for "automatic" skills - vs -"thinking skills" ... the TRUE stutterer.. who has some type of "neurological glitch" in one portion of the brain... when singing, is using the opposite or "non affected" side of the brain when singing.


2.  As for the ACCENT being noticable ~~ or disappearing ~~ Often it is the "choice" of the singer.  You will rarely hear an Irish Ballad performed by a Native Speaker of Irish ... without an Irish Accent..... however, in most cases, accent is caused by rate, vowel and rhythm variations ~~ (l & r) are called "liquid" sounds and are both preceived and in some cases produced much like a "vowel".  With most music being "scripted" .... meaning .. the rate and rhythm are "predetermined/provided" ... most singers "lose" the accent ~~ because they are not in control of the "meter" of the song, and yes, as crystal and gilly mentioned, they are "immitating" not "self-creating".  However, when speaking, they will revert back to their "natural" rate and rhythm ~~ and voila .... the accent returns.


Hope that helps explain that a little bit .... And I apologize if I've bored anyone.  

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[shadow=tomato]If you want your significant other to pay attention to EVERY word you say::
  TALK IN YOUR SLEEP   [/shadow]  

ohhh that's facinating!! really! Cindy..... u's a smart lady!! pretty cool stuff if ya ask me!

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All very cool stuff...

and yeah, I'm sure it has to do with choosing to imitate the original singer in most cases, because not everyone who sings 'american' songs, yet speaks another native language, sings with an american accent. There are a few examples of that here on the SS (can't think of any particular names, but...), I've heard a couple of ladies here who have lovely accents because of their native languages, yet sing american songs.

In the same vein, it's fairly easy for us (americans) to sing songs with accents of other countries... think Beatles songs for example.

Now, doing it 'on purpose' as Jazzy was saying, is quite a cool skill to develop.

Cindy,  So the foreign singer is often doing what a Parrot does ? Just a more sophisticated ability that allows a person, or species to mimic  ?  Similarly when we study foreign language there is a large "listen and repeat" componant.  Some have the ability to absorb and apply these skills intricately, while others do not.

Perhaps an example of people that were born with this brain area developed more-so than the norm are people like Dana Carvey, and Jim Carrey.  The ability to absorb and impersonate not only verbally,  yet use their whole body.

I could not resist posting on this one. When I was in Germany performing of all places in a train station, a group of student were singing along with me to Beatle songs and they sang every word and even English accent perfectly. When I stopped singing they all invited me to go south towards  Black Forest and "socialize" and I found half of them could speak very little English at all.  In fact, I told my notorious Chicken joke with a translator telling in German until the last line "but this one is eating my popcorn."  One can only imagine the linguist nuances of such a cultural jump.

As a younger singer, I learned to do a Liverpool accent fairly well. I don't do it now, but spent an entire summer in my younger bigger than life days pretending to be English and doing fairly well with females. I am English and Irish so it is not a far stretch - but this forum being multi-national the accent thing is a little strange at times.

When some singers with pronounced accents do 80s retro, it does sound strange to me. There are Latin American's here - like Jose - whose posts I reallly enjoy, and I do not hear it in his subs. I have lived in Mexico, speak fluent Spanish, and still don't hear it.

I hope everyone will take this as it is meant, but there are Japanese bands who can also pull this off, and then there are Oriental singers and Hawaian singers, who sing cocktail type music with the accent. In Vietnam, in the bars, during the war, you could hear a lot of this.

Yet, we are global now and you are going to hear "I left my heart in San francisco" in a lot of different accents in Global Karaoke. I am trying to seperate myself from the common expect to hear the song sound the like original artist mode. But I think the bottom line (note) is that whatever twinge there is to it, I listen even more to the voice.

Crystal does effectively pull off singing Country and she does it well. Ironically, Syber doesn't like country, but in real life, originally had a solid country twang to her voice and if she lets herself slip back into "mountian momma" mode has a rich
southern accent.

(I am rambling a bit.. has been awhile) But it is like watching a Danish film the other night whose American title is Webmaster or a Japanese horror film with vampires. I have noticed (especially working with friends in Francce) that in movies, it can get very cultural, in what is funny, what feels strange.

jvj

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There are no accidents in a perfect world   - Blondie

They had "chicken jokes" in the late 1500's ?  Who made guitars in those days

How embarassing. I don't even know who made the first guitar. Now there is a thought. Since this is a delicate topic, I tread lightly. Not the chicken part.

jvj

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There are no accidents in a perfect world   - Blondie

well i talk with the same accent as ozzy osbourne but without stuttering and i aint smashed all the time...hang on he's on the wagon i forgot hehehe....so my accent mixed with a hint of scottish which i am picking up its quite a combination and other than my traditional irish songs which yes i am also half irish i would like to think i dont sing with any accent, i do however think americans all over the board sing with accents...some i like some grate on me...but i likes twangs...i wouldnt mind borrowing one for a day cause i couldnt even attempt country songs hehehe....am i going off subject? oh who cares no bugger notices what i comment anyways unless they wanna scream at me which is frequent hehehe

did someone mention chicken jokes???

Why did the chicken cross the road?


KINDERGARTEN TEACHER: To get to the other side.

LOUISE WOODWARD: Because it wouldn't shut up!! SHUT UP!!

BARRY SCHECK: Were you there? WERE YOU?? Did you see that chicken cross that road? Well?? DID YOU???

O.J. SIMPSON: Absolutely one-hundred percent unsure.

JACK NICHOLSON: 'cause it f******g wanted to. That's the f******g reason.

RONALD REAGAN: I forget.

RICHARD M. NIXON: The chicken did not cross the road. I repeat, the chicken did NOT cross the road.

HOMER SIMPSON: Mmmmmm. Chicken.

JERRY SEINFELD: Why does anyone cross a road? I mean, why doesn't anyone ever think to ask, "What the heck was this chicken doing walking around all over the place, anyway?"

BILL GATES: I have just released the new Chicken Office 2001, which will not only cross roads, but will lay eggs, file your important documents, and balance your checkbook.

OLIVER STONE: The question is not, "Why did the chicken cross the road?" Rather, it is, "Who was crossing the road at the same time, whom we overlooked in our haste to observe the chicken crossing?"

COLONEL SANDERS: I missed one?

colonel sanders the best...classsss

Missy

O.J. SIMPSON: Absolutely one-hundred percent unsure.

My fave!! !

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Accents are strange things.  Sometimes American soccer players who go to play in England and stay there for more than a year or two develop a bizarre not-quite-English-but-certainly-not-American accent.  Others don't change their speech at all no matter how long they stay.

Disclaimer: I know there are many "English" accents and many "American" accents.  Humor me.

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Reward: nine yen in drawer.

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Hallo Steven, this is an interesting subject. I was born and raised in Indonesia, Jakarta to be specific. My father is dutch and my mother is of mixed Indonesian blood. My upbringing was dutch in the parental home and outside the home I had Indonesian Friends I spoke Indonesian with.  I had a dutch education in a dutch high school in Indonesia. The following features are very evident in the speaking voice of us people of mixed blood. When I speak my dutch language, I speak it with an Indonesian heavey accent. And when I speak Indonesian I speak it with a heavy dutch accent. I have no expanation for this. But this is very evident in most of us mixed blood Indonesian/Dutch. Now when I sing Dutch songs I have the Indonesian accent and vice versa, I have the dutch accent in singing Indonesian songs. When it comes to singing north american songs, I sing them with a combined accent (mixed) Indonesian and Dutch. This is very strange. I'm not a talented guy, and that perhaps explains why I can not immitate the original artist voice. I have friends however, very talented friends from Malaysia and from the Philipines who sing Dean Martin as Dean Martin or Elvis as Elvis or the Everly Brothers as the E Brothers with no accent whatsoever. My opinion is that we must talk about very talented people.  People with the talent to immitate voice and movement of the artist they are immitating. Some of these singers don't understand one word of english. About parrots: parrots are very telented immitaters but not all parrots can immitate the human voice and words. Very interesting. Thank you for bringing this up. Best Regards, John.

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KEEP EXPECTATIONS REASONABLE.

Yeah I for one have to agree with Big John here. English isn't my native language either. I have so much of an accent that it isn't even funny when I sing. It didn't really start to haunt me until I recorded myself singing. I have gone about my business living in the US, speaking english every day, being married to someone that only speaks english and I haven't spoken more than 1 hour put together of my native language the last 7 years. To my horror I managed to run across a disc with CDG songs from my native country and I sang my heart out and was really pleased with my singing. And then I listened to the recording afterwards. I had more of an American accent, then my native accent!, I sang with less accent in English. Go figure, I just can't win . So now I speak/sing with a bastard accent in both english and in my native language.